OVERVIEW

The course tackles a musical phenomenon with drama-performance implications at a Master’s level: from opera to the different forms of musical theatre to drama-musical genres bereft of a stage (such as oratorios or passions). The focus therefore is on the meeting point between music and theatre, examining how the different languages (verbal, musical, performative) interact reciprocally giving place to an aesthetic object of value.

AIMS AND CONTENT

LEARNING OUTCOMES

The course aims to develop awareness of the central questions of musical theatre in its historical development in the modern and contemporary period, giving students the necessary theoretical instruments for a critical evaluation of the interaction between music and theatre in the broader sense of the term.

AIMS AND LEARNING OUTCOMES

The course aims at developing – at the level of knowledge – the awareness of the central questions of musical theatre in its historical development in modern and contemporary age, giving students – at the level of abilities - the necessary theoretical instruments for a critical evaluation of the interaction between music and theatre in the broader sense of the term.

6 CFU

At the end of the course students will be able to competently understand the musical theatre phenomena studied in class, remember and aknowledge the contribution of different components that compose the aesthetic object of extreme complexity; he/she will have the tools in order to analyze such complexity and will be able to apply this knowledge in the critical evaluation, also in creative terms, of the meaning that each component brings to the overall dialectic. 

9 CFU

The above mentioned learning outcomes will be achieved on a deeper level of awareness, both in the extent of the context the phenomena discussed are inscribed and in the more detailed analysis of the musico-dramatical questions implied.

PREREQUISITES

Basic knowledge of history of music and theatre in Europe, 17th to 20th centuries.

TEACHING METHODS

Lectures with systematic use of audiovisual support: CD, DVD, web.

Due to the pandemic, the course will be held online on Teams. The code to access the team will be published in the course AulaWeb before the course begins.  

Students are warmly invited to attend classes, because of the listening and watching experiences the course offers.

Students are warmly invited to enroll to Aulaweb, where study materials are going to be uploaded.

The teacher is available to discuss the preparation for students willing to study in a language other than Italian.

SYLLABUS/CONTENT

The Don Giovanni myth in opera, Mozart to Saramago

The Don Giovanni myth has underwent, from its beginnings in early 17th century to present times, more than 3000 new versions in the different fields of literature, drama, music and cinema: a wonderful array of forms and variants which have been constantly renovating, under ever changing aesthetic premises, the enduring vitality of a legend which counts as an authentic mythical archetype of Western collective imagination. Born at the time of Counterreformation as powerful moral theatre, the modern myth of the unrepentant womanizer has enormously broadened its scope reaching a multiplicity of genres and therefore exposing the essential core of its inspiration to the transformations produced by the encounter with Enlightenment, Romantic, 20th-century and contemporary cultures. The course aims at investigating the itinerary of the myth in opera in the broadest chronological scope, from the first opera devoted to this topic in 1669 to 2006. Two specific features will characterize the programme. On one side two works will be highlighted: the most iconic opera of the entire tradition, Mozart’s Don Giovanni, and the most recent opera to be considered Azio Corghi’s Il dissolute assolto on a libretto by Nobel-Prize winner José Saramago, staged in 2006. On the other side the course will be distinguished by a distinctly interdisciplinary cut, since it will intertwin the exploration of the myth in opera (specifically in comic opera, boasting a rich tradition of 18th- and 19th-century Convitati di pietra) with the investigation of the origins and tradition of the myth in spoken theatre (from Tirso de Molina to Molière, from commedia dell’arte to Goldoni), following its footsteps until Mario Luzi’s drama Rosales, one of the latest 20th-century metamorphoses of the myth.

RECOMMENDED READING/BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bibliography in Italian

For 6 CFU

1. U. Curi, Filosofia del Don Giovanni. Alle origini di un mito moderno, Torino, Bollati Boringhieri, 2018, pp.
2. R. Raffaelli, Don Giovanni tra antropologia e filologia. Nuove ricerche, Rimini, Guaraldi, 2006, pp.
3. G. Macchia, Vita, avventure e morte di Don Giovanni, Milano, Adelphi, 1995, pp.113-157.
4. N. Pirrotta, Don Giovanni in musica, Venezia, Marsilio, 1999 (i capitoli Don Giovanni va all’opera; Don Giovanni nell’opera comica; I più immediati antecedenti di Mozart)
5. Il convitato di pietra, in Canovacci dell’arte. Canovacci della gloriosa commedia dell’arte italiana raccolti e presentati da Anton Giulio Bragaglia, Torino, Il dramma – SET, 1943, pp. 15-22.
6. Libretto e registrazione in CD o DVD di un Convitato di pietra a scelta tra quelli musicati da Giuseppe Gazzaniga, Giacomo Tritto e Giovanni Pacini.
7. L. Da Ponte – W.A. Mozart, Don Giovanni, a cura di M. Gurrieri, in W.A. Mozart, Don Giovanni, Programma di sala, Venezia, Teatro La Fenice, 2010, pp. 59-120.
8. Registrazione in CD o DVD di W.A. Mozart, Don Giovanni
9. S. Arienta, “Don Giovanni”, una sfida all’ordine costituito nell’Europa della Restaurazione: le manipolazioni di un testo scomodo, in W.A. Mozart, Don Giovanni, Milano, Edizioni del Teatro alla Scala, 2011, pp. 119-135.
10. R. Mellace, La carriera di un libertino. Metamorfosi contemporanee del mito, ivi, pp. 167-175.
11. I. Burton, L’archetipo del seduttore, ivi, pp. 177-183.
12. S. Kierkegaard, Don Giovanni. La musica di Mozart e l’eros, Milano, Mondadori, 1976 (solo L’idea del Don Giovanni e la musica di Mozart. I. La genialità sensuale come seduzione)
13. J. Saramago – A. Corghi, Il dissoluto assolto, in P. Hindemith, Sancta Susanna – A. Corghi, Il dissoluto assolto, Milano, Edizioni del Teatro alla Scala, 2006, pp. 72-92.
14. R. Mellace, Musica e letteratura all’alba del Duemila: “Il dissoluto assolto” di José Saramago e Azio Corghi, in Viaggi italo-francesi. Scritti “musicali” per Adriana Guarnieri, a cura di Marica Bottaro e Francesco Cesari, Lucca, LIM, 2020, pp. 463-476.

N.B.: All readings are going to be uploaded in Aulaweb after the course begins, except for n. 4, available at Umanistica Balbidue and Balbisei libraries and for sale. As far as operas are concerned, only librettos are going to be uploaded, but no video or audio files, available for sale and in the web.

Enrolling in the course's Aulaweb is warmly recommended. 

For 9 CFU

1. U. Curi, Filosofia del Don Giovanni. Alle origini di un mito moderno, Torino, Bollati Boringhieri, 2018, pp.
2. R. Raffaelli, Don Giovanni tra antropologia e filologia. Nuove ricerche, Rimini, Guaraldi, 2006, pp.
3. G. Macchia, Vita, avventure e morte di Don Giovanni, Milano, Adelphi, 1995, pp.113-157.
4. N. Pirrotta, Don Giovanni in musica, Venezia, Marsilio, 1999 (i capitoli Don Giovanni va all’opera; Don Giovanni nell’opera comica; I più immediati antecedenti di Mozart)
5. Il convitato di pietra, in Canovacci dell’arte. Canovacci della gloriosa commedia dell’arte italiana raccolti e presentati da Anton Giulio Bragaglia, Torino, Il dramma – SET, 1943, pp. 15-22.
6. M. Zanobini, Il Don Giovanni Tenorio di Carlo Goldoni. Alle origini di un mito moderno, in «Italian Studies in Southern Africa / Studi d'Italianistica nell'Africa Australe», XXIX, 2, 2016, pp. 1-26.
7. L. Paesani, I duellanti in Idem, Porta, Bertati, Da Ponte: Don Giovanni con il facsimile del libretto di Nunziato Porta per Praga del 1776, Milano, LED, 2012, pp. 25-53.
8. Due libretti e registrazioni in CD o DVD di un Convitato di pietra a scelta tra quelli musicati da Giuseppe Gazzaniga, Giacomo Tritto e Giovanni Pacini.
9. Libretto e registrazione in CD o DVD di W.A. Mozart, Don Giovanni
10. L. Da Ponte – W.A. Mozart, Don Giovanni, a cura di M. Gurrieri, in W.A. Mozart, Don Giovanni, Programma di sala, Venezia, Teatro La Fenice, 2010, pp. 59-120.
11. S. Arienta, “Don Giovanni”, una sfida all’ordine costituito nell’Europa della Restaurazione: le manipolazioni di un testo scomodo, in W.A. Mozart, Don Giovanni, Milano, Edizioni del Teatro alla Scala, 2011, pp. 119-135.
12. R. Mellace, La carriera di un libertino. Metamorfosi contemporanee del mito, ivi, pp. 167-175.
13. I. Burton, L’archetipo del seduttore, ivi, pp. 177-183.
14. B.A. Brown, Leporello’s ‘catalogue’ aria: The French connection, in Quinto seminario di filologia musicale. Mozart 2006, a cura di G. Fornari, Pisa, ETS, 2011, pp. 135-176.
15. S. Kierkegaard, Don Giovanni. La musica di Mozart e l’eros, Milano, Mondadori, 1976 (solo L’idea del Don Giovanni e la musica di Mozart. I. La genialità sensuale come seduzione)
16. P.A. Sequeri, Eccetto Mozart. Una passione teologica, Milano, Glossa, 2006, pp. 17-32.
17. J. Saramago – A. Corghi, Il dissoluto assolto, in P. Hindemith, Sancta Susanna – A. Corghi, Il dissoluto assolto, Milano, Edizioni del Teatro alla Scala, 2006, pp. 72-92.
18. G. Seminara, Genesi di un libretto, ivi, pp. 137-177.
19. R. Mellace, Musica e letteratura all’alba del Duemila: “Il dissoluto assolto” di José Saramago e Azio Corghi, in Viaggi italo-francesi. Scritti “musicali” per Adriana Guarnieri, a cura di Marica Bottaro e Francesco Cesari, Lucca, LIM, 2020, pp. 463-476.

N.B.: All readings are going to be uploaded in Aulaweb after the course begins, except for n. 4, available at Umanistica Balbidue and Balbisei libraries and for sale. As far as operas are concerned, only librettos are going to be uploaded, but no video or audio files, available for sale and in the web.

Enrolling in the course's Aulaweb is warmly recommended. 

TEACHERS AND EXAM BOARD

Exam Board

RAFFAELE MELLACE (President)

DAVIDE MINGOZZI

GIADA ROBERTA VIVIANI (Substitute)

LESSONS

Class schedule

MUSICAL DRAMATURGY

EXAMS

EXAM DESCRIPTION

Oral

ASSESSMENT METHODS

The exam consists of an assessment of the contents of the course and the bibliography. Knowledge of the authors, genre and historical-cultural context of the works treated in the course programme. The evaluation will consider knowledge of the programme (topics tackled in lectures, readings indicated in the bibliography, material made available on Aulaweb, mandatory or optional operas), as well as presentation ability, use of specific lexicon and capacity for critical reworking.

Exam schedule